by Leanne Banks
“Right. You’re in town on a visit, staying with your sister and a bunch of other people, and you’re going to present them with a flea-ridden bitch and a bunch of leaky, squealing mongrel pups. You want to stop off somewhere for some gift wrap?”
She glared at him. Less than an hour ago she had come apart in his arms, and now she was looking at him as if she’d sooner get out and walk than spend another two minutes in his company.
He shrugged. “Fine. You want ’em, you got ’em, only first I’m going to drive by Wanda’s place and see if she’s missing a pet.”
“Fine. You do that.”
He wondered fleetingly when the word “Fine” had become a swear word.
Neither of them spoke again until he reached the end of the rutted, muddy road leading to the blacktop. “Turn left,” she snapped.
He turned right.
“My car’s that way, remember? Or shall I get out here and walk back?”
“With or without the cargo?” He nodded to the back seat, where slurping noises indicated either bath time or suppertime.
“With,” she said, and sighed. “I guess.”
It was all the opening he needed. “Look, let’s save the arguments until we know for sure what we’re arguing about, okay? Wanda lives in a mobile home park off Wheeler Road, couple of miles from here. We’ll check it out first. If Goldie’s hers, that settles it.”
“It doesn’t settle anything. The dog’s obviously been mistreated. She’s got worms and fleas and ear mites—I’m pretty sure she’s starting an eye infection, and she’s not even wearing a collar.”
“Hey, cut her some slack, will you? Wanda’s a nice woman.” Debatable, but then, he didn’t really know the divorcée who worked the day shift at Coyote Harry’s and occasionally took in overnight guests of the male persuasion. He’d spent one less-than-memorable half hour in her bed a couple of years ago, and left a more than generous tip. From the rumpled bed she’d watched him leave, obviously realizing he wouldn’t be back.
But she was a damn good waitress.
“I’ll reserve judgment.” Wrapping her arms around her chest, Ann Elise sat poker-faced for the rest of the drive.
“Nice sunset,” he observed when they turned off onto Wheeler. The sun was already well below the horizon, but red and gold streaks angled up from the horizon, chasing the fast moving cloud layer that had dumped more than six inches of rain on the surrounding area over the past twenty-four hours.
A plastic bag skittered across the road and clung to a leafless bush. They passed a small bungalow with roughly a hundred separate lighted Christmas decorations in an otherwise barren front yard.
“We were supposed to finish decorating the tree after supper,” she said quietly.
Aha. The olive branch.
“We’ve already done ours. Pop’s a great hand at untangling all the lights, and Mom’s a good director. Me, all I have to do is follow orders.”
They passed a doublewide outlined completely in blue lights, with a gigantic wreath on the front door. Ann Elise sighed. She was nibbling her lower lip, and on impulse, he laid a hand on her knee. Her jeans were still slightly damp. “You cold?” he asked. “I can turn up the heat.”
“No, I’m fine.”
Her voice said otherwise, but he wasn’t about to argue. “Hey, it’s Christmas Eve,” he reminded her, forcing a cheerful note to his voice. “Who’d have thought after all these years we’d be celebrating together?”
That time he got a reaction. She rolled her eyes and started to speak. Fortunately, he got a word in first. “There it is,” he announced. “The one with the…overflowing garbage can,” he finished lamely.
Pulling over to the side of the road, they stared at the only dark residence among a dozen or more that were lighted up and decorated with everything from a battalion of knee-high plastic elves, to candles, to rooftop sleighs and a flock of reindeer grazing on the front lawn.
From the back seat, Goldie whimpered. Without turning, Joe said, “Easy, girl, let’s see what’s going on before we make any hasty decisions, all right?”
It was Ann Elise who replied. “I’ve already made a decision. Goldie was miles away from this place. If she was happy here she would never have left, certainly not this close to term. She’d have found a warm, dry place under the trailer, if not inside.”
Joe was squinting at his cell phone, punching in a number. “Harry? Joe Halloran. Look, is Wanda working tonight?”
While he listened to Harry, whoever that was, Ann Elise unsnapped her seat belt and twisted around onto her knees. “Hi, how ya doing, honey?” she whispered. “That’s some Christmas present you’ve got there.” Joe had put half the stuff into the back of the pickup, shoved everything else over to one side and folded up the seat, making a cozy nest on the blanket for the canine family.
She heard him say, “Since week before last?”
More silence. She reached down and picked up one of the pups. Goldie licked her hand, then ignored her to nose the runt of the litter into a more favorable position. “You’re going to be one busy mama for the next few weeks,” Ann Elise whispered just as Joe was signing off. “From now on, you’ll be eating for ten, which means we’re going to have to triple your rations.”
“Well, that takes care of that,” Joe said flatly. Starting up the engine, he made a U-turn and headed back out Wheeler Road. “Wanda quit work and left town over a week ago. Left owing two months rent, plus utility. Harry knew about the dog—her name’s Madonna, by the way.”
“I like Goldilocks better.”
“Yeah, me, too. Anyhow, he said he drove out to see if she was sick—Wanda, that is—when she didn’t show up two days in a row. Her phone had already been disconnected. He checked in with the rental office that handles the park and found out she’d split. Said he saw the dog, but couldn’t catch up with her, so he called animal control. Evidently they couldn’t find her, either. They never called and he never checked back.”
They drove on in silence, headed back to where she had left her car by the side of the road. The chilling thought occurred to her that it might have been stolen by now, or at least vandalized. She had insurance on the brand-new van she drove back in Dallas, but she wasn’t sure it covered a situation like this.
“You know the saddest thing of all?” she murmured after a while.
“Hmm?” He slowed, cautiously easing into a fifty-foot stretch of standing water. Conditions were improving, but they were still a long way from good.
“Well, hardly the saddest of all, but still…” She sighed. “It was the only place without a single decoration, not even a red ribbon on the mail box.”
“What, you want to go back and decorate her mailbox? How about the Camden place, you want to string some lights out there, too?”
“Can’t. Power’s probably off.”
“You got that right. Like for the past twenty years,” he said, but he was grinning.
Ann Elise felt some of the awkwardness dissipate. There were still issues to be confronted between them—or not. But for right now, at least they could talk. “So what do we do with Goldie and company?”
“How about my place for now?”
“What about your family?”
“Not a problem. Pop loves animals and Mom’s cat’s pretty tolerant. I’ve got a couple of holding pens off my office, but I have a feeling they’ll all end up in the house for now.”
Practical or not, Ann Elise wasn’t quite ready to part with her little family. Even among her animal-rescue friends, she was known as a soft touch. As in soft in the head. Taking in a rat snake with a skin condition while she’d still been trying to find a good home for the house chicken had been the last straw. The chicken had freaked and flown up onto the light fixture and the snake had crawled inside a piano she was keeping for a friend, underneath the strings, and refused to come out.
“Look, how about this,” she said decisively. “I’ll follow you home and we can run it by your folks. If they’r
e willing to adopt ten strays who’ll soon be eating them out of house and home, then that’s fine. Otherwise, I’m taking them home with me.”
“Chow’s not a problem. Believe it or not, I do have a few sources.”
“Ha. Hay, oats and corn?”
“Good roughage,” he said, and shot her a quick grin. “What do you say we get ’em settled in at my place—then, once you’re satisfied with the accommodations I can follow you home to make sure you get there all right. Maybe tomorrow you can drive out again just to see how they’re doing, how’s that sound?”
She didn’t bother to reply, as by that time they’d reached her car. Joe pulled up behind the stranded vehicle and climbed out, coming around to open her door.
Ann Elise didn’t wait, but slid down off the high seat unassisted. She wasn’t about to risk finding herself in his arms again. She had enough to deal with without another reminder.
And then she was staring at the bright red sticker someone had placed on the rear window of her aunt’s middle-aged compact car. “Joe? Somebody decorated it.”
Joe shook his head. “Sorry. Highway Patrol,” he told her. “Shows they’ve been by and checked it out. If it’s still here, sooner or later they’ll have it towed, run the license and notify you where to find it.”
“Oh.” She looked so crestfallen, he almost wished he’d let her go on thinking some kind soul had decorated her car for Christmas.
“Al?” he said tentatively. She was shivering, patting her pockets, a look of sheer panic spreading over her face. “Honey, what’s wrong?”
Chapter 7
“If there’s a key hidden out somewhere, I can’t find it,” Joe said, pulling his head out from under the left front fender. He’d checked all the usual places—license plate, gas flap and all four fenders. “Catch-22. Without getting inside, I can’t release the hood to check underneath.”
The temperature was dropping precipitously as the last few streaks of faded lavender disappeared from the sky. Inside the pickup, Ann Elise punched in Faith’s number on Joe’s cell phone. Sensing her tension, Goldie whimpered.
“It’s all right, girl,” she said quietly. “Still busy,” she called over to where he was standing, scratching his head. “If you know of any locksmiths who might be willing to come out on Christmas Eve, maybe I could call information and get the number?”
He replaced his curled-brim black Stetson. “Or maybe you could just come home with me and we’ll send someone out tomorrow,” he countered.
“Or maybe you could just take me and my dogs to Baker’s Acres and I can get hold of a locksmith tomorrow.” The truck smelled of dog and old leather, but at least it was warm. Joe was outside in his shirtsleeves. Just because she’d declined the use of his coat, he stubbornly refused to wear the thing. Chivalry gone awry.
“You’re going to drag some poor guy out on Christmas Day?”
Her shoulders drooped in discouragement. It wasn’t a lack of planning, she told herself, it really wasn’t. She was an excellent planner. She happened to have been born with an organized mind. Virgoans were known for it.
Not that she believed in astrology, but still, being a Virgo, she’d read a few books on the subject just to see if there could possibly be anything to it. Members of her sun sign were also known for their analytical qualities.
“Let me try something first,” Joe said. He sauntered across the highway, hooked a booted foot on the running board and leaned over the tool compartment on the back of his truck.
Opening the door, she reached back inside the cab and grabbed his jacket. Virgoans were also practical. Wrapped in the oversized coat, she breathed in the scent of leather and a faint hint of something spicy while she watched him rummage around in the big aluminum compartment. Her gaze fastened on his trim backside and she wondered how long it was going to take her to get over him this time. If after fourteen years she hadn’t gotten over a single kiss, she could just see herself fifty years from now, tottering around a nursing home, telling everyone she could buttonhole about her brown-haired, brown-eyed lover and their one-night stand in a haystack on Christmas Eve back in the year of ought-three.
When he jumped back to the ground, she followed him to her car, where he went to work, using a flat tool that looked like a saw blade. She couldn’t see what he was doing, but he was muttering curses. Okay, so she could pay for a broken window, no problem, although driving might be a tad chilly until she could arrange to have it repaired.
“Just be glad it’s not one of the newer models,” he said, and she nodded without the least notion of what he meant.
Then he swung open the car door and stepped away. “Your carriage awaits, m’lady.”
“Oh, thank heavens,” she breathed fervently, and brushed past him. Reaching inside, she snatched up her damp, rumpled raincoat, and there they were, right where she’d tossed them. Her keys, lying on top of her favorite leather purse—the one with the Betadine stains on the flap and the ragged edge where a teething pup had worked it over while its mama was being treated for a torn ear.
“I have never—ever—felt so stupid,” she said, backing out of the car.
“No kidding. Never?”
She sent him a quelling look, then shook her head, disarmed by a smile that could melt glaciers. “All right, it was stupid, locking my keys inside. You probably won’t believe me, but I have a reputation for being pretty cool in an emergency.”
“Who said I didn’t believe you?”
She shot him another look. “It was the double whammy,” she said, checking to see that everything was still inside her purse. To think that anyone could have come by and…
“Double whammy, hmm.” He leaned against the side of the car, arms crossed, one ankle hooked over the other, as if he had all the time in the world. As if it weren’t practically dark, with miles to go and decisions still to be made.
She refused to rise to the bait. “The flood and Goldie,” she said firmly, but she could tell by the way he cocked one eyebrow that he wasn’t buying it. “Oh, let’s just go if we’re going.” She slid in under the wheel. He knew very well what she meant. Being stopped by a flooded creek and helping to rescue a bitch in labor was enough to throw anyone off-stride, but it had been seeing him again after fourteen years that had blown every fuse in her otherwise functional brain. Not to mention what had happened in the barn. “Well? Are you going to stand there smirking all night?”
Smooth, Ann Elise. You’re handling this just beautifully.
Joe had rolled down the window. Now he leaned close enough that she could feel his warm breath on her cool skin. “You know what they say.” There was a distinct gleam of amusement in those clear amber eyes.
“What, trouble comes in threes?” She switched on the engine and shifted into reverse, but kept her foot on the brake. “Look, if we’re going to do this thing then let’s get started. I don’t know about you, but I happen to have plans for the evening.”
Without another word he turned and sauntered across to his pickup. She could barely see his silhouette against the darkening sky, but that didn’t keep her from watching him every step of the way.
The same way she used to watch him back when she’d had to invent excuses to hang out near the field during football practice, too far away to see the sparkle in his laughing eyes, but close enough to think highly improper thoughts. She hadn’t been the only girl there, either, although she’d probably been the oldest of his admirers. Cradle-robbing—that’s what it was called. If he’d ever gone through an awkward adolescence, it must have been before he hit middle school. For all she knew he could have been born six foot three, with those wide shoulders, those long, lean limbs and that melt-your-heart smile.
He could’ve played pro football, he was that good. Instead, he’d chosen to get his DVM and come back to Mission Creek to look after his father’s ranch and both his parents.
And she’d chosen to buy into an established practice, and then take it over, remaining far enough from
Mission Creek so that she could see her sisters occasionally, but wouldn’t have to see Joe and his perky little cheerleader every time she ventured into town.
Backing around, she waited for him to lead the way. Had it meant anything at all to him? Those hours together in the barn? Did it fall under the heading of casual sex? A good time was had by all, see you around? It definitely wasn’t the sort of thing she did on a regular basis…or ever.
Ann Elise had always prided herself on being a pragmatist, starting soon after her parents had been killed, when she and her sisters had had to leave behind the only home they’d ever known and move to a different town to live with relatives who’d been all but strangers. She had learned to assess a situation, set her sights on a goal and work relentlessly toward it, never allowing optimism to warp her vision.
Some might even call that pessimism, but it was actually only realism. There were no guarantees in life; anyone who expected miracles deserved what they got.
“So what am I going to do about you now?” she whispered, following the Christmas-red taillights three car lengths ahead.
They passed the turnoff that led to the Baker’s place. Joe kept on going. Ann Elise kept on following. Following the dogs, she told herself, not Joe. Because while it might be more practical for him to keep them for the time being, that didn’t mean she intended to relinquish control. Dogs were her business. He dealt mostly with big farm animals. The fundamentals might be the same, but the two specialties were miles apart.
Excuses, excuses…
The Halloran place had been pointed out to her years ago. “That’s where Joe Halloran lives,” someone had said. A classmate. Female, and thus, as enthralled by the young athlete as she’d been.
By Mission Creek standards it wasn’t a large ranch, but it was definitely bigger than Uncle Lloyd’s had been, even before Aunt Beth had sold off great gobs of acreage. There was a neat sign on the gatepost announcing J. Halloran, DVM, with a rocking H just beneath.
At the end of a long, well-tended dirt road, the house looked as if it had started out small and been added on to over the years. The result was no particular style, but attractive and inviting, even so. There was an enormous wreath on the front door and swags of greenery laced around the porch rail. Electric candles gleamed from every window.
